Dawn (Luke 24:1-12)

Dawn was still a ways off when the women set out . . . Luke doesn’t tell us who they are, until the end . . . In Matthew, it’s Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of James, in Mark it’s Mary and Mary and Salome, and over in John, it’s Mary Magdalene alone. Here in Luke, it’s Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James and “the other women with them,” women who had been witnesses to the crucifixion, who’d stayed with Jesus and seen the tomb and how his body had been laid. Note the conspicuous lack of male disciples in the mix . . .

After the women had seen and done all that, after they’d faithfully follow Jesus to the end, they’d gone out and bought and prepared the spices required to anoint the dead. It’s not something they wanted to do, they were still grieving the loss of their beloved, and wanted nothing more than to hole up with their sorrow. In addition, the whole purpose was to disguise the stench of decay, but by Sunday morning—they couldn’t do it on the Sabbath, which began at sundown—by Sunday morning, that ship would have sailed, so it wouldn’t be a pleasant thing to do. And because it was Mary Magdalene, among others, who did the job, it helped fuel centuries of speculation about the relationship of Jesus and Mary Magdalen because, you see, normally it was the task of the wife to anoint the dead.

Be that as it may, sometime before dawn on the first day of the week, the women creep through the Jerusalem streets . . . they’d left as soon as they could see to walk, as soon as they could make out shapes in the gloom. Occasionally, they pass houses flickering with light and movement, as shopkeepers and artisans prepare for their day’s work . . . dogs yip out their morning greetings and warnings as they pass, cocks crow in anticipation of the sun, and a fine mist swirls around their feet. It isn’t far to Joseph of Arimathea’s garden tomb, where they’d laid him, but the women take it slowly, gliding through town, in no hurry to do their distasteful deed.

And as they go, they wonder how they’re going to move the huge stone disk away from the tomb’s mouth. Will there be grave-tenders about this early, or would they be forced to wait till later in the day to attend to their task? The dawn is breaking as they reach the tomb, the sun’s already beginning to heat up the air. Imagine the relief when they see the stone already rolled away, relief and confusion that this should be so, confusion that only increases when they see that the tomb is empty . . . And they stand around worrying . . . did bandits carry off the body of their beloved? Worse, had it been it a pack of the feral dogsthat haunt the countryside? Not once do they consider a third explanation, that he’d been risen from the dead . . . as good Jewish women, the thought doesn’t even cross their minds.

Tears spring up in their eyes, and they turn to go, when behold! Two young men in dazzling white are there before them, and the women throw themselves trembling on the floor of the tomb . . . and are these the same guys who would appear at Jesus’ ascension? When he returns to the side of God? Hard to know for sure, but they dosay something similar: “Why do you look for the living among the dead?” And they remind them of what they already should know: that he’d told them he must be arrested, crucified and raised again.

But the way it’s phrased is more than a reminder. For one thing, it’s not a question,it’s not “Remember what he said to you?” It’s “Rememberwhat he saidto you.” In other words, they’re toldto remember, commandedto do it. And another thing and the Greek word we translate here as “remember” implies more than just the retrieval of a memory. It implies bringing past actions to bear on the present, resulting in new power and insight. The same word appears in Mary’s Magnificat with reference to God helping Israel “in remembrance of God’s mercy,” and in the crucified thief’s plea, “Jesus, remember me.” It’s a tangible, consequential form of remembrance, a kind of remembering that is also a kind of action. The women at the tomb are told to bring to recollection what Jesus had told them, and then let that combineor interactwith what they are witnessing. It carries the force of both an epiphany anda commission: they remember his words, they take stock of them and, in light of what they experience at the tomb, they return from there and tell all this to the eleven and to the rest. The past recollection colors what they experience, and together they form what they do in the future.

That’skindof how it’s supposed to work for everyone, isn’t it? What we’ve been told in the past impingesupon the present, it informsour view of what’s going on, and then interactswith our present experience to determine a course of action. Like the women, we’re to remember what we’ve been told, especially with regards to how we are supposed to live as children of God. And what we’ve been toldcomes from a variety of sources, doesn’t it? It comes from Scripture, from the combined wisdom of fellow believers who were on the ground floor, so to speak, who were thereor close tothe seminal events of our faith. And there are other sources . . . there are the accumulated teaching of the church. The written wisdom of the Desert Fathers and Mothers. The livedwisdom of ordinary Christians, distilled and passed down in written and oral form. All of this is what Christians have been told.

But as the Greek word implies, there is anothercrucial ingredient: our own, lived experience. We can’t take any of these sources in isolation, including scripture, despite Luther’s famous dictum sola scriptura.Even thatwas a remembrance, in this passage’s sense: Luther took what he’d been told, the holy scripture, and let it inform what he’d experienced as excesses of the church, and voilá:ninety-five theses, nailed to a church door. We Presbyterians have even codified the command as “Reformed and always being reformed by the Word of God.” In practice, this has meant that the church is always to be reformed by what it has been told—aka the Word of God in all its forms. Including, of course, the Word as expressed in science, history, the arts . . . all influenced by the church’s present experience, what it sees and feels in the world.

Well. The women remember Christ’s words to them, there on that first Easter morn, they experiencethe empty tomb, and they are driven to action: they return from the tomb and tell the eleven—cowering somewhere in fear of the authorities—about what they had experienced. And they scoffed and laughed at them, and refused to believe them, because were they not women? And were not women subject to hysteria, to anxious thoughts and deed? And besides, even though all of them had heardJesus’ words—that he’d be handed over to be crucified, and on the third day rise again—none of them had experiencedthem. None of them had seen the empty tomb, none of them had talk to the shining men.

But now Peter—who embodies both the best and the worst in the apostles, both you-are-the-Messiah faith and deny-three-times doubt—Peter gets up and runs—runs!—to the tomb, sees the grave-clothes by themselves, and goes home amazed. And does he also believe? I think so. I think that like the women earlier, he has remembered what Jesus had said: he’s recalled the words and experienced the reality of the empty tomb, and it has sent him flying home in amazement.

Brothers and sisters, we are Peter . . . Peter who expresses doubt and who also expresses great faith. And like Peter, we do not really believe, do we not really knowuntil we’ve experienced the empty tomb. I know, I know . . . despite what the song says, we were notthere at the empty tomb, any more than we were physicallythere when they crucified my Lord. And yet, just as we crucify him by our doubt, by our stubborn refusal to give our lives as totally as he gave his, we experience the empty tomb, we experience the resurrection, every day of our lives? Is it not there in the Spring, as life arises anew after the barrenness of winter? Is it not there as despair is turned into fragile, unlooked for hope? Is it not there as sorrow is resurrected into joy?

Friends, resurrection is all around us, in the overwhelming good that’s in our world, in the life that is everyday snatched from death’s bony grip. That’s what the resurrection represents, isn’t it? It’s what we, like the women at the tomb, are commanded to remember. The ultimate banishment of darkness, the ultimate realization of Pau’s cry: Death, where is thy sting, grave where is thy victory. And it’s all summed up by one phrase: He is risen; he is risen indeed. Amen.

I Love a Parade (Palm Sunday; Luke 19:24-40)

Pontius Pilate, governor of Judea, staggered out of his tent into the cold dawn. It was the Sunday before Passover, and the second day in a row that he’d been up with the sun, and he didn’t like it one little bit. It made him irritable—more than usual, anyway—and he snapped at the attendant who was trying to hold his horse still so he could mount. It was a big brute, 16 hands tall, and pure white—a fitting mount for such a powerful man. Of course, he would have preferred to ride in a cart, or a palanquin carried by slaves, sheltered from the fierce sun, but one must keep up appearances, one must put on a show of power for the peasants along the way.

Pilate had left his villa at the shiny new city on the Mediterranean a couple of days before, and that didn’t help his mood any. Caesarea Maritima—Caesarea by the Sea—was all carved, Corinthian marble; his villa was lavishly appointed and almost obscenely comfortable, as befitted the biggest fish in that small Palestinian pond. And Pilate hated to leave it behind, especially since his destination was that poxy, backwater town called Jerusalem, home of a people so backwards they only worshiped one god. But it had to be done, Pilate had to go to that pestilent place, because it was Passover week, and the locals—always unfriendly—could get downright belligerentat festival time. Many was the time anti-government violence had sprung up during those times, and Passover—the celebration of Jewish delivery from an earlierset of oppressors—could be one of the roughest.

So it was the custom of the Romans to beef up their presence in Jerusalem at Passover, to make an imperial show—one reason for the column of imperial cavalry and soldiers that rode along—and that meant that the governor himself needed to be there, along with all his assorted courtiers and toadies, and didn’t they make a grand sight, livery jangling, pennants snapping in the sun, impassive faces of the troops . . . it said to all they passed: “You can’t stand in the face of the glorious might of the Roman Empire.”

Meanwhile, on the opposite side of town, the east side, another procession was getting underway. The star of thatparade was an itinerant Jewish teacher named Jesus, who was a powerful preacher and a compassionate crusader for social justice and—in the eyes of the Jewish religious establishment, at least—a dangerous subversive. He’d been running around Palestine, preaching about the kingdom of God which, to hear him tell it, was a place where all were welcome, nobody was hungry, and, best of all, nobody oppressed anybody. A place where the first were last and the last first, where God's good gifts were not amassed by a minority of wealthy landowners in their cities and palaces and villas. A place, in short, the exact opposite of the Roman Empire, and—critically—the exact opposite of the scribes and priests of the Temple hierarchy who, through creative interpretation of Hebrew law, were able to become wealthy landowners themselves.

So it’s appropriate that this secondprocession came from exactly the oppositeside of town as Pilate’s. It’s staging area was the Mount of Olives, across the Kidron Valley from the city, and Jesus—born in the nothing town of Nazareth and definitely notof the ruling class—gathered his followers and laid out the plan: “Go into that village over there, and you’ll find a colt—a young donkey, to be exact—tied there that’s never been ridden.” And how did he know it would be there? I have no idea. Maybe he sent somebody ahead and planted it, maybe he “saw” it with that otherworldly insight he seemed to possess. However it happened, it’s clear that Jesus planned it, and what’s more, he planned it with prophecy in mind: listen to this passage from the Old Testament prophet Zechariah: “Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter Jerusalem! Lo, your king comes to you; triumphant and victorious is he, humble and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.” It’s clear from all the stage-management that he wants both his disciples and Jerusalem onlookers to see the fulfillment of that prophecy.

And if he isthe symbol of that prophecy, if he is indeedthe humble king riding on a donkey, what kind of monarch would he be? The rest of the Zechariah passage tellsus: “He will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the war-horse from Jerusalem; and the battle bow shall be cut off, and he shall command peace to the nations.” This king, riding on a donkey, will banish war from the land—no more chariots, war-horses, or bows. He will be command peace to the nations; in fact, he will be a kingof peace. Not exactly the play-book of the Roman Emperor. 

And did Jesus plan hisentry into the city to coincide with that of Pilate? Biblical scholars Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan think so—in their book The Last Week,they write that it was a “prearranged ‘counter-procession,’” designed in deliberate contrast to the one on the other side of town. Whatever the case, it certainly did the trick: Jesus’s procession proclaimed the kingdom of God; Pilate’s proclaimed the power of empire. The two processions embodied the central conflict of the week that led to Jesus’s crucifixion.

You often hear this dichotomy referred to as the “ways of the world” versus the “ways of the kingdom,” but I think that’s didactic and over-simplified. It’s dualistic, and displays one of the major problems with that kind of thinking: it encourages us in the impression that the world is “evil” and the kingdom “good.” Paul’s habit of referring to it as the “ways of the flesh” versus the “ways of the Spirit” doesn’t help—a lot of folks read “flesh” as “sex,” and it gets conflated with the human body, once again encourages us to think that the body is inferior and sinful as opposed to some spirit that is pure and separate from the flesh. Dualism at its finest, pf course: God made the world and all that is in it and how can it be bad? As the old saying goes, “God don’t make no trash,” and I believe that to be true.

What Pilate’s procession symbolized—and what Jesus’ countered—was not “the world” or humanity or even Pilate himself. It was what social scientists call a “domination system” and Paul—who knew all about such things—called the “powers and principalities.” Borg and Crossan write that a domination system is the most common form of social system and is marked by three major features: first, political oppression, where the many are ruled by the few, the powerful and wealthy elites. The second characteristic is economic exploitation, where a high percentage of the society’s wealth goes into the coffers of the wealthy and powerful. The third characteristic is religious legitimation—the systems are justified with religious language. The rulers are there by divine right, because God ordains it, and the social system or order is the will of God.

In Jerusalem, you actually got two domination systems in one: the local one, legitimized by the religious establishment and ruled by wealthy landowners—some of whom were the religious authorities themselves—and the Roman one, with the emperor—Tiberius, at the moment—as the divinely-ordained ruler. And Tiberius was sodivinely ordained that he was called Son of God—God, of course, being his predecessor, Caesar Augustus.

And so that’s what Jesus and Pilate rode into on that fine spring day, one in a procession that was the embodimentof the domination system, and one in a procession that was almost a parodyof it. I mean, pictureit in your mind: here’s Jesus, on an untrained donkey—though the word colt can mean either a young horse or a young donkey, Mark makes it clear it was a donkey—here he is on an untrained donkey, probably shying away from the onlookers . . . cloaks being thrown in front of it would have sent it over the edge—here he is, on an young animal that was all over the road, his feet practically dragging the ground, and his disciples—notice that Luke doesn’tsay the crowds—his disciples,were hollering and carrying on: “Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven, and glory in the highest heaven!”

And so the story of Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem, so often portrayed as a triumphal entry, can be viewed in an entirely different way: his followers shouting “Blessed is the king” and that kingon a runaway donkey, feet dragging the ground, looking about as much like an earthly monarch as Ido. Which, as y’all know, is not very much. And Jesus’ appearanceis contrapuntal to the message of his followers—and could that have been the point?—and especiallyso to what was happening on the other side of town, where the very kingly Pilate was riding in on a very kingly horse.

And so you can see that it was a very political scene on that first Palm Sunday, it couldn’t helpbut be that. But one of the marvelous things about 

Scripture is that it works on so many levels. And of course, one of those levels theological one, and it’s the same point PauI would make twenty-some-odd years later: the wisdom of God is foolishnessto the powers that be. What Jesus was s doingthat day was demonstrating that principle in graphic, no-uncertain-terms, that the last will be first and the first last, and he was playing the last and you-know-who across town was playing the first.

And at the start of Holy Week, the time we observe the passion of Christ—his trial, degradation and crucifixion—it’s good to remember that this is only the beginning of Jesus’ demonstration of that theological fact. On Maundy Thursday, at the last Supper, he washes the disciples’ feet like slave, like the servant that he was, and on Friday, which Christians call “good” he is nailed to a tree in the ultimate demonstration, the ultimate statement of God’s true nature. Amen.

Farewell, My Beloved (John 12:1-8; Lent 5C)

It was the magic hour . . . the light had that lambent, red-gold cast that photographers cherish, light that washes everything in a soft, numinous radiance. Gathered in the courtyard for supper, the family—Mary, Martha and Lazarus—and extended family—Jesus and some of his disciples—felt bathed in a warm glow as they celebrated the return of their patriarch. For his part, Lazarus was bemused, even a bit befuddled, if you want to know the truth; it wasn’t every day that one returned from the dead. Talk about your near-death experience . . . Lazarus’ went on for four days,not just a few minutes on some doctor’s operating table. That kind of thing will take the wind out of your sales, let me tell you.What was it likefor the resurrected man? Where did he gofor those four days? Or was he just . . . dead? Absent? Nowhere?

As for Jesus, he was with the ones he loves . . . Mary and Martha and Lazarus were like family to him . . . maybe more than his biologicalone; after all, wasn’t it them he refused to see? Wasn’t it about them that he said “my familyare thos4 who do the will of God?” Like a lot of his hometown friends, his biological kin hadn’t known exactly what to do with him when he visited Nazareth. They weren’t sure who he was anymore, he’d seemedlike their son and brother Jesus, but at the same time . . . different. But here, with this family, he could let down his hair, be who he was, which even the Son of Man needed now and again.

And in the luminous evening, perhaps after a glass or two of wine, they began to remember the past, to reminisce about Jesus’ remarkable ministry, of which Martha and Mary and Lazarus had shared such a big part. They chuckled over Martha’s fussiness, her indignation when Mary had sat before the master ad learned while she did all the work. They shared songs of thanksgiving as they recalled Jesus’ resurrection of Lazarus, and poked gentle fun at the resurrect-ee as he looked benignly on.

Only Mary felt the shadow that hung over them. Perhaps it was a premonition of things to come, a fore-shadowing of anothersupper, just days from then, that would be called his last. Or maybe the report that the Sanhedrin had ordered his arrest had filtered out to Bethany, just a couple of miles east of the city. Suddenly, she brought out a pound of perfume, made of pure nard, and weeping openly, poured it over her friend’s feet, and then wiped it his feet with her long, dark hair. And this is a shockingly intimate act, even more so than it would be today, and there was a stunned silence, and it felt like all the air had been sucked from the room, only to come rushing back as Mary shook out her hair and the house was filled with the fragrance of perfume.

And I’m not sure if the onlookers—Martha and Lazarus and the disciples present—were more shocked at the intimacy or the fact that she anointed his feet.His head, they could’ve understood. After all, that was where you anointed kings, conquerers, those who—like Jesus—were in the royal Davidic line. But thefeet?Who anointed feet,at least those of the living . . .And I don’t know about Martha and Lazarus, but the disciples had all heard Jesus tell them—three times,already—that he was going to be arrested and killed. But only Mary seemed to know it what it all meant, whether she was aware of it or not, heractions at thissupper foreshadowed Jesusactions at that finalsupper, when hewould wash the disciples feet, thus pointing to how to the Christian life.

And notice that she doesn’t say a thing: her actions speak louder than words. She’s demonstratingthe gospel, there’s no needfor words. But not so Judas . . . besides Jesus himself, he’s the only one who speaks in this episode. And what he says seems, on the surface at least, to make a lot of sense: “Why,” he says, “was this perfume not sold for three hundred denarii and the money given to the poor?” And three hundred denarii is an humongousamount, a full year’s wages, and you could peach a whole sermonon this one line, and many have . . . it symbolizes a balance that modern churches are always trying to strike: how much of God’s resources do you expend doing work in the world—arguably the main reason we’re here—as opposed to gussying up the building, making glorious worship, and saving for a rainy day? The question is often framed as looking outward, into the needs of the community, and what we can do to fulfill them, versus looking inward, into our own survival, into taking care of our ownneeds. And pastors like me spend an inordinate amount of time trying to make inward-looking congregations look outward, but in realty, it’s a balance, ‘cause if a congregation doesn’t exist, how can it do any good?

Of course, in our passage, John the Gospel-writer stacks the deck by claiming that Judas was a thief, and that if the common purse was fatter, there would be more for him to steal. And of course, this is more foreshadowing of Judas’ more dastardly deed, which in six more days would lurch into motion. But Jesus himself seems to come down on the side of worship, delivering a punch line that has befuddled interpreters for a long time: “Leave her alone. She bought tins that she might keep it for the day of my burial.” And we’re so used to that line-or maybe it’s been so overshadowed by the nextone—that we often overlook the strangeness of this statement . . . if she kept it for the day of his burial, why did she use it then?He surely wasn’t being buried at that moment . . . there he was right in front of them, alive and kicking. Was it a fault in the transmission of the story? After all, John wrote this down at least a half-century after the fact, and who knows what happened to it in all that time . . . anybody who’s played the popular party game where something is whispered in an ear, and then around a circle, knows how oral transmission can change what was originally said.

A more intriguing possibility is that Jesus perceived time in a fundamentally different manner from us. Or to be more accurate, he perceives time as it really is, aka an illusioncreated by our finite consciousness. In a recent interview for Krista Tippet’s “On Being” radio program, Rabbi Lawrence Kushner claimed that God experiences time as all of a piece: everything at once, past, presence and future. Indeed, when Christian and Eastern mystics come to enlightenment, they experience much the same thing, and of course, in his work on relativity, Albert Einstein showed that linear time isan illusion, that everything that ever happened and ever will happen is happening right “now.”

And so Jesus, seeing “naked” reality, reality not filtered through un-enlightened consciousness, recognizes what is really going on with Mary: she has perceived reality just a little bit, she has become enlightened, converted, she has come to a higher perception, if only of a limited nature. She realizes, if only on a subconscious level, what the others do not: Jesus’ death is bound up in the present moment, it is there in the workings and mechanisms of the powers that be, that his death was present for them in that moment, just as it is in every moment.

And what set her apart, what made this higher knowledge, this intuition, as we might call it, possible? Well, I believe it was one thing: her overwhelming love for and acceptance of Jesus Christ. Love. Relationship.The connective tissue of the universe. Love . . . the very identity of God’s own self, of which Jesus himself was the image, wrought in human form. Jesus’ death and burial is the eternaldeath and burial, the death and burial of us all, for is not Christ inus all?

Well. That kind of metaphysical gymnastics makes Jesus’ final statement almost easy: “You always have the poor with you, but you do not always have me.” And incredibly, some people, even given Jesus’ whole lifeof feeding and healing the poor, some nevertheless use this one line, taken out of context to justify nothelping the poor. Jesus said there’ll always be poor, and if Jesus said it, it must be true, so there’s really no reason to bust our britches helping them, is there? Besides, if we convert ‘em they’ll go to heaven anyway,so better to do thatthan feed them . . .

But some scholars think that Jesus was quoting Deuteronomy 15:11, which commands Israel to “open your hand to the poor,” because “there will never cease to be some in need.” Which, of course, is the exact opposite from that most cynical of readings. Then again, I notice that unlike Deuteronomy, Jesus uses the present tense. Instead of “you willalways have the poor” he says “you always have the poor.” Is it more of that cosmic timelessness that seems be/to have been/will be about the Christ?

One thing is certain: there is always inequity, there is always sin, there are always systems that oppress the many for the benefit of the few, but we do not always have Jesus’ physical presence. We do not have his example showing us what to do, how to live, how to love . . . and that’s what Mary understood, and what she demonstrated in that one, selfless act of devotion. You can do all the left-brain acrobatics you want, all the analysis of the Greek and clever interpretation you want, but in the end it come down to relationship, in comes down to love.

John doesn’t tell us what went down that night after the anointing, after Jesus’ rebuke of Judas. He doessay that people came to see Lazarus because he’d been resurrected, and so the authorities planned to kill himtoo, busy beavers that they were. For John, the point of the story were Mary’s actions, Judas’ response, and Jesus’ response to that. But I imagine that Jesus folds a weeping Mary into his arms, kisses the top of her head, and the dinner party continues on into the deepening evening, with Judas perhaps chastened, perhaps convinced more than ever to bring the whole thing down.

And there’s a lot of theology to say about what was done and said, a lot hasbeen said over the millennia, but to me what’s important is the scene, the symbols, the tableau. A community—a family, really—gathered around the table, a safe space in the ever-growing darkness. And holding it all together, making it all possible, is the presence of the Christ which, though no longer in bodily form, is still with us, he in us and we in him. Amen.

Higher Ground (Luke 15:1-32)

Last week, we talked a little about the nature of repentance . . . remember? We saw that the Greek was literally “meta-noia,” higher mind, so that to repent is to come to a “higher mind.” And one of the things about the ancient world-view is that mindwas considered to be localized in the heart.So yet anotherway to translate the Greek word normally rendered repent might be “change of heart,” as in “she wanted to turn her in, but she had a change of heart.”

So with this in mind let’s look at the parable of the Prodigal Son, which is ostensibly about repentance and forgiveness. The setting here is crucial: Jesus is being criticized for associating with the wrong kind of people, tax collectors and sinners, who were coming to him in droves, or at least in great enough numbers that it became noticeable to the religious authorities—personified by scribes and Pharisees—who had rulesabout who good Jews could associate with, especially those who would be teachers. And tax-collectors and other assorted sinners—here the word sinners should be taken in its broad sense of “ritually unclean”—tax-collectors and sinners were definitely not on that list. And the scribes and Pharisees were muttering to themselves and saying ”Thisguy is eating with sinners, who does he think heis?. How can he presume to teach if he can’t follow the rules/‘

And as a response, Jesus launches into some stories, which were one of his preferred methods of teaching. He’s saying: “You think that’sbreaking the rules? Which one of you having a hundred sheep, if he loses just onedoesn’t break all the rules of farming and economics and good hygiene and leave the ninety-nine to the ravages of wolves and sheep-rustlers and go to find that one measly, lost sheep? And what woman, having ten coins, and losing one doesn’t leave the other nine unprotected and turn her whole houseinside and out, looking for it? I’m telling you, just as that shepherd and that housewife rejoice over finding’s what was lost, so there will be joy in heaven over the one sinner, the one outcast, who repents, i.e.,who has a change of heart.

So now onto the main attraction, “The Parable of the Prodigal, His Brother and Their Forgiving Father,” aka “The Prodigal Son.” Remembering that this is a parable, and thus fiction,we shouldn’t be surprised that Jesus sets it up masterfully: he gives us two sons, two choices, the better to compare and contrast with. One, the younger, asks for his part of his inheritance which, given that he was the second son, would have amounted to a third. And the father gives it to him, and he goes off and squanders it living large, maybe on wine and fast Gentile women. (We know he goes to Gentile lands, where they have pigs, ‘cause he ends up slopping them.) 

Anyway, the second son was entitled to a third of his father’s stuff, and it wasn’t unheard of that a younger son would take his inheritance early and establish his own household, and if the second son had done that,if he’d established his own household on his third of the land, adjacent to his father and brother’s portion, it wouldn’t have been that big a deal. Farming families tended to live in multi-household compounds, and the father would have still had use of the land. And that was importantin that desperate, hardscrabble country because you needed all the land you could get to graze and water your sheep just to survive.

Still: if the second son had done the right thing and set up his own household, it wouldn’t have been a good story—this is a parable,remember—and Jesus lays it on thick: the boy sells his inherited land and heads for Vegas, and this not only hurts his father but his brother as well, whose family also depends on the production of that land. And Jesus wants us to know that this isn’ta good guy, he’s weak, he’s dissolute, he doesn’t respect his family, and he pays the price by starving, which is a delicious irony because he has set his father and brother and their households up for starvation should the climate go South. And when itdoes,he’s hungry and nobody will even give him pigfood, much less sit him down to supper. And slopping the hogs is the ultimate humiliation for a good Jewish boy; in fact, what Jesus is saying is that he’s nota good Jewish boy. He’s not just a sinner,not just unclean, but reallyunclean, so unclean an observantJew couldn’t get within five counties of him. And have you ever tried to get the stench of pig out your clothes? Can’t. Be. Done.

So the second son has gone about as low as you can go, and he decides he’d better cut his losses, and it’s important to note that the word “repent” is not used in this parable, as it is in the two previous parables, And if you read carefully, the second son doesn’trepent, he doesn’tcome to a higher mind, Luke says he comes to himself.And we knowwhat thatis, don’t we? It’s a rogue, a bounder, as they said in the old days. In other words, a one-hundred-percent pure, no-gettng-around-it jerk. o we should read what he says with a heaping tablespoon of salt: he realizes that even his fathers hired hands—who he no doubt used to lord over—eat really well, and here he is starving! And there’s not a hintthat he realizes his own actions brought this on, not a bit of a sign he’s had a change of heart. Instead, he comes up with a scheme to get back in the old man’s graces: I’ll tell him I’ve sinned against him and God and no longer worthy to be his son! Treat me like a hired hand! The old guy always didlike groveling . . .

It reminds me of Jimmy Swaggart, the TV evangelist caught cheating on his wife, who blubbered into the camera “I have sinned,” and who may have been truly sorry, but was also trying to save a million dollar media empire. And it worked, sort of: while Swaggart’s TV empire isn’t what it was, he still has a ministry, you can find his sermons on Youtube . . . and I think it’s fine, giving a guy a second chance, because after all, isn’t forgiveness baked into our faith? Isn’t it all about God’s grace, who forgives us no matter what?

Anyway, our un-repentant, un-higher-minded son heads back home, no doubt rehearsing in his head what he’s going to say, but his father sees him coming, is ‘filled with compassion,” and kisses him and hugs his neck. And his son launches into his prepared speech exactly as he’s rehearsed it, with one exception: he doesn’t offer to be treated like he was one of the hired hands. Maybe, as one commentator put it, when he’s faced with his father’s overwhelming love, he begins to trulyrepent. Could be . . . but—cynic that I am—Ithink it’s because his father’s given him what he wants and he doesn’t haveto go any further. Indeed, his father gives him his best robe—doubtless his own—and a ring and sandals, and he sends for a calf, and not just anycalf, but the fattedcalf, the one kept on hand for special occasions and special guests and the like. And the wayward son thinks “Why enter life-long servitude if I don’t have to?”

Speaking of servitude, or at least hard work, here comes the elder son out of the field, where he’s been doing what he should, working to ensure the survival of the clan, and he hears the thrum of lutes and the tinkling of ankle-bells as people dance, and he wonders just what in Sam Hill is going on? Is there a special visitor? Has some regional politician, some toady of the governor, shown up? Or is it some random visitor, who his father was bound, by the rules of hospitality to entertain? When he finds out it’s none of those things, that it’s his reprobate brother, come slinking back with his tail between his legs, he just loses it: “for all these years I’ve been working like a slave for you, I’ve never disobeyed your command, not even once, and you’ve never even given me one, measly little goat!”

And who among us hasn’t felt that way? Who here hasn’t seen someone who hasn’t done the work, who slips by on cleverness and charm, get all the goodies, or at least as any goodies as we’ve gotten, who’s studied for the test, who’s followed all the rules? Who here hasn’t felt irritated as all get-out by a line hopper or a cheat who’s come out smelling like a rose? I know Ihave . . . I am the oldest of five, and I remember my father sitting me down one time and explaining why my sister Kathy seemed to be treated better, saying “the squeaky wheel gets all the grease, you know, and implying that I was the bigger person. And I remember thinking “Right, a likely story, what a crock . . . “ and I might be wrong, but I don’t think that by telling this parable Jesus is interested in family dynamics. I think he has bigger fish to fry. 

Recall that he’s spinning this yarn to a bunch of Pharisees and scribes, avatars of the Israelite political elite (remember there was no difference between religion and politics in those days). As such, they have a vested interest in the status quo, which is that you play by the rules, you work for a living, you do things decently and in good order. You obey your father as the head of the household, you work for the good of the family, and that way you serve the social order. You do notsquander money away on dissolute living—which is whatever society says it is—you play by the rules. You work for a living and open a savings account, diversifying your portfolio so you can weather the storms of economic adversity and make bankers and financial consultants’ boat payments. You get a 30-year mortgage and 2.4 children and thereby the whole societal structure remains stable, which, of course, includes the scribes and Pharisees, who’s position depends on people—especially those downstream in the social order—doing their part.

And so, for Jesus’ audience, the elder son has a point. You don’t reward someone for not working, do you? You don’t just give someone something for nothing, do you? What about teaching someone a lesson, what about teaching someone to fish,for Pete’s sake? This . . . second-son person comes waltzing back to a family whose herds and land are two-thirds of what they once were because of himexpecting to be fed and clothed and not payfor what he’s done, well we know what we’ddo. Oops . . . I mean they know what they’ddo . . .

But the father does just the oppositeof what is expected, he overturns societal expectations, and really ticks-off the oldest son. He says: what’s the problem? What I do or do not do doesn’t affect you . . . you’re still getting all I have to give . . . be happyfor your brother, and if you can’t do that, at least be happy for me.Because we hadto celebrate and rejoice, it’s what families do.Your brother was dead and has come to life, he was lost and has been found.”

And this is why it’s important to at least acknowledge the two preceding parables: they both have heaven rejoicing more over one sinner who has repented, who has changed her heart,than ninety-ninewho have no need, who believe the right things, or do the right things or who’s hearts are already in the right place. But in this story, the “sinner,” the wayward second son, has not had such an epiphany, he’s not reformed his heart, and there is still rejoicing.The forgiveness of the father is given without the son having to do a darn thing. It’s just given.

This parable can be taken on at least two levels. As a morality tale, as instruction on how weshould behave, it fits ourcontext—Lent is a time to meditate on how we can donbetter,how to come to a higher understanding of our ownshortcomings, and what we can do to ameliorate them. Anger and resentment aren’t helpful, either to ourselves or the community in which we live. They can tear societies apart—look at our own divided land—and break open and tear down our own lives, our own well-being.

But there’s another, allegorical level, and it’s equally relevant, equally apt: we can view the unconditional love of the father as an analogof God’s own love, as the way God behaves toward God’s children. As Buddhist might say, the loving father of Jesus’ story is a pointer to the moon, not the moon itself, but an impression of it, one that shows an aspect of an otherwise unimaginable reality. And in this case, it’s a pretty awesome aspect: it’s a winter to the other side of Lent, to the resurrection, which is itself a pointer to the overwhelming, love of God, who conquers death and forgives us not only for what we have done, but for what we have left undone.Amen.

Crime and Punishment? (Luke 13:1-9)

A few years ago, on National Public Radio, Scott Simon interviewed James Martin, a priest of the Society of Jesus, better known as the Jesuits. Father Martin is Editor at Large of the Jesuit magazine America, and author of numerous books, including The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything. The two discussed simplicity and poverty, two vows the Jesuits keep, and Martin was witty and funny, but when Simon asked his final question, the talk turned serious.  “I’ve saved the hardest question for last,” he said.  “If there is a God, why do little children suffer?”

“That isthe hardest question,” Martin said.  “And I think the answer is ‘we don’t know.’”  Which is an honest answer, at least … he didn’t trot out the latest Christ-o-babble, he didn’t give his pet theories, or Aristotle’s pet theories, he just answered quite simply “we don’t know.”

The ancients, in Jesus’ day and before, thought they knew.  They thought that bad things were God’s punishment for sins. God visited punishment upon people for doing things God didn’t like.  Things such as, oh, invading countries for their natural resources . . . keeping a vast segment of their population in poverty to support the upper class . . . dating foreigners.  Stuff like that.  And for these offences, God would visit plagues and famines and invasions, and visits from your in-laws.  And bad things for seemingly-innocent people like the “little children” of the radio host’s question were explained away by this as well: you see, the ancients didn’t have the same concepts of individuality that we do.  (Which is why those of us in modern Western societies need to take care in interpreting stuff in the Bible, much of which applies to groups of people—nations, peoples or tribes many times—we need to be careful how we take concepts in scripture and apply them whole-hog to the faith and spirituality of the individual.  They often just don’t fit.)

Anyway, the ancients had an answer for the question of why bad things happen to little, seemingly innocent children, and that was that they weren’t really innocent.  Remembering they had no concept of the individual, the sins of the group they belonged to—the peoples, the nation, the tribe, whatever—were thought to be imputed onto all of its members. Thus, they could say “the sins of the fathers are visited upon the sons,” etc., etc.,never thinking at the time how that let womenoff the hook.

Of course, this idea of God punishing one’s sins by doing bad things to one hasn’t completely died—witness the our brothers and sisters that blamed Katrina on the gay community—and come on, admit it: we all, from time to time, ask: why me?  And this idea of calamity as punishment for sin, at least a is coherent, straightforward answer for Scott Simon’s question to Father Martin, and it informs the first part of this rather difficult passage.  Jesus is teaching a crowd of people, as he was wont to do, and somebody tells him about some Galileans that Pilate had—apparently—slaughtered.  They said Pilate—who was notoriously brutal—had mingled the blood of these Galileans with their own sacrifices.  And Jesus says: “Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were worse sinners than all other Galileans?” Then he answers his own question: “No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish as they did.” And now I bet they were sorry they brought it up, because he goes right on: “And what about those eighteen others killed when the Tower of Siloam fell—bang!—right on their heads?  Do think they were worse than anybody else living in Jerusalem?”  And again, the answer is “not on your life … and unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did.”

We need to stop right here and acknowledge that all this talk of sin and repentance makes a lot of us modern Christians—myself included, if you must know—really nervous.  What do you mean, repent, we want to ask Jesus.  What do you mean, we’re gonna perish just like they did if we don’t turn our lives around?  Where’s the grace?  Where’s the forgiveness?  For that matter, where’s the God-is-love business that we all like to quote? Seems a little harsh to me, and a little un-politically-correct as well.  How we gonna pack ‘em into the pews if we keep reading about stuff like this?

Good question.  Almost as good as the one about why bad things happen to little children.  And notice that Jesus doesn’t debunk the notion of suffering as a consequence of sin—though he doesn’t support it, either—he simply tells us that the ones who died in those sudden slaughters—some by accident, and some by cruelest murder—the ones who died in those incidents aren’t any more sinful than anyone else in Galilee or Jerusalem.  They were sudden, unexpected, and maybe that’s the key: maybe Jesus is saying the same thing he says elsewhere.  Don’t wait to repent, don’t wait to come to a higher mind, which is the literal meaning of the Greek word, because death can come at any time, whether by the knives of bloody Pilate or the simple cracking of a tower stone.  It’s consistent with his teaching, and that of his follower Paul, who warns us to keep awake, lest we be caught napping when the end times come.

And so, the force of Jesus’ argument seems to be not that his listeners will perish without repentance, but that they’ll perish, as he says, “just as those Galileans and Jerusalemites they did.”  That is, in the same, unrepentant state, without having experienced the fullness of life on earth of those who have turned theirs around, or come to that higher understanding.  Be careful, Jesus says, to do this while you can, because if a tower falls on you, or a homicidal maniac like Pilate gets hold of you, it’ll be too late.

Now I know that, as in most places we see it in Scripture, we tend to read “perish” as “go to hell,” where the fire will lick your bones, crackle, crackle, crackle, and ol’ Scratch will stick you in the behind with a pointy fork, but that’s not what Jesus is talking about here … he’s not talking about heaven or hell, but plain old death—really perishing—and living life fulfilled and to our greatest potential before we do.  But if we turn our lives around,  if we come to a higher knowledge, literally a “higher mind,” we can live that life here on earth, we can live in God’s kingdom without going anywhere else.  And I think that that’s what this repentance is of which Jesus speaks.  We are called to that higher mind, that living out of our calling here on earth, regardless of what happens after we die.

And now, he launches into another parable, and it’s not much more promising than the pronouncements about repent or perish.  The owner of the vineyard has a fig tree planted in his vineyard, but when he came looking for fruit, there wasn’t any . . . which is understandable: room in a first-century vineyard is limited, and if a plant doesn’t produce, the  livelihood of the farmer dictates that it be gotten rid of replaced by one that will produce.  Only natural, only right.  Gotta be productive if you’re a fig plant, or else you’ll get ripped out.

And he tells the gardener—the one who planted the tree in the first place—he tells him “Cut that puppy down!  I’ve come here for three years running, and no fruit!  Why waste the soil?  Cut it down!” But the gardener sticks up for the poor little plant, saying let it alone for just one more year and let me tend it, let me aerate the roots and pack a little manure around the base, and if it doesn’t bear fruit in a year, then by all means: cut it down!”

And our tendency is to try to treat this allegorically, like we’re used to doing with parables: our tendency is to assign identities to each player. Let’s see now: the owner represents God, the fig tree is a recalcitrant nation, or is it an individual, or a tribe. But if God’s the owner, then who’s the gardener, who is it supposed to be who intercedes for the poor little plant? Jesus?  The Holy Spirit?  And notice that it isn’t a plant’s fault that it doesn’t bear fruit . . . even the most ignorant farmer of the day would know that some will produce, some won’t, them’s the breaks, Jake.

And I wish I could tell you exactly what it means—that’s kind of my job, you know—but it’s just a little too . . . irregular for that, a little too out of round.  On the surface, it’s the same: the plant better turn it’s life around before it’s too late, silly plant, but then what’s all this about the gardener?  What about this entity who helps and nourishes the plant in its efforts at sanctification?  Well . . . maybe Jesus is allowing as how in this, we will not be alone.

On NPR, after Scott Simon asks Father Martin that embarrassing question, why do bad things happen to innocent little children, and Martin admits he does not know the answer, he says this:  “for the Christian, there is the person of Christ, who has gone through suffering himself, and who understands our suffering.”  Christ, he is saying, is with us, along for the ride, and he’s been there, and thus . . . gets it.  He understands. He has suffered about as badly as any human can, and understands, deeply and fully.

But more than that: we are nurtured along the way, in our Christian life, we are helped and taught and supported . . . our roots are aerated and we’re watered, and manure is spread around our base.  Paul put it this way: “the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words.”  We are not alone on our journey of repentance, on our travels toward Christ.  This turning-around business, this coming to a new mind, as daunting as it may seem, is not up to us.  It is under the direction and guidance of God the Holy Spirit, and we are accompanied along the way by our brother through adoption, Jesus Christ. And to that I say, Thanks be to God! Amen.

Crazy Like a Fox (Luke 13:31-35; Lent 2C)

Have you ever noticed that movies and TV shows love to construct a snappy ending to one scene—called in the biz a “button?” Many times, the button not only ends first scene but sets up the next, like when in a sitcom the couple is sitting around the living room, talking about the guy’s ex, and the doorbell rings, and whaddya know: the ex is standing on the other side. Or in an action flick the heroes are talking about how quiet things are, and the next thing you hear is the whistling of an incoming missile . . .Well, that’s kind of what Luke is doing here. The last line of the scene previous to this one is “. . . some are last who will be first, and some are first who will be last,” one of Jesus’ favorite sayings. Then the very next line,the first of our passage, describes some Pharisees, come to warn Jesus the Herod is out to get him. And Luke makes sure we get the connection by the way he phrases it: he said they deliver their warning at that very hour.That is, at the very time he was pronouncing that the first will be last and the last will be first, the Pharisees appear.

So it’s clear we’re supposed to associate the first who will be last in the kingdom of God with the action of Herod wanting to kill him. And there’s little doubt what Herod’s motive is: he’s definitely among the first, definitely among the powers that be, and he’s worried about somebody running around his “kingdom” saying things like he’s gonna be last. After all, Jesus had been a follower—however briefly—of John the Baptist, the lastrabble-rouser to gain popular support, and Herod had felt threatened enough to imprison John and execute him at the whim of a child. So there’s that.

Then again, Herod wasn’t noted for being the most stable of rulers: this was Antipas, the son of Herod the Great, perhaps the most paranoid man who’d ever lived, and the apple hadn’t fallen too far from the tree. To make things worse, at his death, the current Herod had inherited only a quarter of his realm. That’s the excuse the Romans used for calling him a “tetrarch,” or ruler of a fourth. They wouldn’t let him call himself “king,” doubtless to keep him in his place, but perhaps also because they didn’t trust him. At any rate, Antipas was insecure and paranoid, and constantly on the lookout for threats, perceived or real, and he'd found one in Jesus of Nazareth.

That explains Herod’s being out to get him but what about the Pharisees? Up until this point in Luke’s gospel they’d been portrayed as exclusively antithetic to Jesus and his ministry, as opponents and constant critics of Jesus and his band of disciples. And now they’re shown to be helping him, warning him about Herod’s plan. And that points to a common misconception about Pharisees, that they were implacable enemies of Jesus, out to get him, that they were by and large bad people. This impression isn’t helped by the fact that the Gospels—especially John—tended to emphasize the contentious side of their relationship. But the fact is that Pharisees were among the best of the Jewish people, men you definitely wouldn’t mind your daughter bringing home. And we knowthat there weresome on Jesus’ side, notably Nicodemus, who nevertheless had to sneak around to see Jesus in the dark. Finally, some of the scenes we interpret as life-and-death arguments between Pharisees and Jesus were in actuality scenes of rabbinic back-and-forth; give and take argument was how rabbis often interacted. They learned from one another that way.

That said, it’s also possible that Luke wants us to understand that these Pharisees were part of the problem, that he considers them the powers-that-be amongst those first who would be last. Jesus himself indicates that this might be the case, that he assumes Herod sentthem. After all, he tells them to “go tell that fox” for him, as if they werecoming from him . . . but whatever the case, it’s clear that Jesus is no a-political bumpkin here, he has a keen grasp of the politics of the situation. And he calls him a name that Herod would certainly not appreciate: though like today, the fox was considered wily, it was also a symbol of sneaky destruction, of underhanded down-and-dirtiness. And he makes it clear that Herod isn’t going to deter him from his mission: “ell that fox Listen—and isn’t thatan insolent thing to say to someone in power—“Listen up! I’m casting out demons and performing cures ” And it’s in the same vein of what he told the followers of John the Baptist when they came to question him whether he’s the “one who is to come.” He’s doing the things that one is supposed to do, so who does he think he is? If it walkslike a messianic duck and talkslike a messianic duck . . . he wants Herod to know in no uncertain terms that the time has been fulfilled, the Jubilee—which we’ve seenis a motif in Luke—has finally arrived.

He says he’s performing cures that day and the next, but that on the third day he must finish up, but he’s not talking about ending his ministry three days from that time—we know, in fact, that he didn’t. What he isdoing is pointing to his resurrection, which happens, of course, on the third day after his death. And so here in Luke, unlike, say, Mark, the important thing is the resurrection, and in fact, the whole thing about going to Jerusalem is that he can’t conceive of a prophet being killed outsidethat benighted city. So he knows fully what’s coming when he gets there, but his eyes are on the resurrection, and he has to get himself killed, and it has to be in Jerusalem, ‘cause where else would it be? Jerusalem is the city that kills the prophets who go there, the city that stones them to death. It’s the city that’s the center of a religion that murders those sent there from its god. Jerusalem is the city that eats its own young.

Not unlike anotherpower center in anothertime and place . . . or maybe Einstein and the Buddha were right and it’s the sameone, perhaps Jerusalem and Washington are avatars, eternal echoes of all the power-places around the globe, all the places where the powers-that-be congregate, down through the millennia, around the globe. Babylon, Moscow, Athens . . . Los Angeles, Beijing, Caracas . . . all places where prophets go to be killed, and their dreams along with them. Legislators go to Washington, idealistic and ready to effect meaningful, positive change, and end up dying—sometimes literally—but most times, these days at least, only their dreams and good intentions . . .

And Jesus is going to Jerusalem on his own dime, of his own free will, because of what he knows hasto happen, he has to be killed so he can be resurrected on that third day. And far from turning away from that seat of power, where Herod awaits like some petty, malignant spider, he heads straight into its maw. And though he lays a prophetic pronouncement on them—your house is leftto you—his main thrust is compassion: he likens himself to a mother hen, who longs to shelter Jerusalem’s children under her wings. Far from condemning the city where he will meet his fate, he laments over it, he criesover it, and the episode ends with anticipation of his glorious arrival there, where jubilant crowds throw cloaks and palms in the road to cushion his way. 

So on this second Sunday of Lent, we see a Jesus whose eyes are on the prize, but it’s not his death, it’s what happens three days after that. His ministry includes healing and curing and feeding—the blind willgain sight and the oppressed will be set free—but it doesn’t end there. Nor does it end hanging on a tree in the city that eats its young. It doesn’t end with his crucifixion, but what happens after, and thatis no less than conquering death itself. 

And here, Jesus has sent a message to that embodiment of death, that avatar of the powers that be: “You telldeath (that old fox!) that my mission—to heal and liberate, to restore and deliver—cannot be denied. They’ll arrest and abuse me, they’ll kill and bury me, but I must be on my way. For on the third day, I will rise, and thenwhat will you do? Death and hate and violence will be vanquished, and that Great Jubilee, that New Exodus, that new day of redemption will arrive.”

The contrast is stunning: the powers that be, bent on domination and subjugation, contrasted with the powers of life,embodied in the one we follow, Jesus of Nazareth. As Paul writes, “O death, where is thy sting, O grave where thy victory,” so it is that here in Lent, while we ponder its primal sadness, while we contemplate our role in the mechanisms of pain and denial, we also look forward to that wonderful resurrection morning, three days later. Amen.